Featured

In this category you will discover our best stories and articles featured and served up in one place. Dive in and soak up some of the best New Zealand surfing content right here on your device or computer.

I’d been tracking it from a week out and it played the notes of the forecast with precision. For big wave surfing this was a classic: its deep fetch straight off the western edge of Antarctica, landing an almost direct hit on the southeast corner of New Zealand. Then, sometime...

Cracking it in the pressure cooker that is the Australian surfing hotbed is no easy feat. Which makes 18-year-old Te Kehukehu Butler’s rise so impressive. In 2018 he was embroiled in a season-long battle with Callum Robson, of Evans Head, NSW, in the WSL Australasian/Oceania Junior Qualifying Series (JQS). At...

There is no doubting that Piha local Elliot Paerata-Reid is on a performance surge right now. His 2018 Indonesian season was sensational in and out of competition, but the Mega Swell of late July saw him paddling into some of the most intense waves ever witnessed at his favourite Indo...

Billy Stairmand has beaten good friend Ricardo Christie to kick off 2019 in the best way possible claiming his seventh title at the Health 2000 National Surfing Championships completed at Stent Road in Taranaki today. Taranaki turned on another stellar day of surf and weather with clean 1.5m waves and...

Chasing waves on Enderby Island starts with getting to know the locals. They’re furry and blanket the place like lolling beach bums of the south. A little respect (and a lot of patience) will go a long way in this remote part of the Southern Ocean perched on the western...

Finding new waves on planet earth these days is a pretty tough ask. Sure the odd slab might be unearthed here and there, but the goalposts are well out on any significant discoveries. Especially here in New Zealand. So when I was given the chance to join an expedition voyage...

Paige Hareb is New Zealand’s most successful surfer and her achievements, as the World Surf League (WSL) season for 2018 come to a close, stand testament to her competitive character and determination. The 2018 season was her seventh year competing on the WSL Championship Tour and she was thrown every...

Well, it’s about as official as unofficial gets. Our team of analysts have crunched every possible scenario and WSL possibility and it’s beyond a shadow of doubt. We’ve put ourselves out there, we’re calling it first: our Kiwi QS charger, Ricardo Christie, is now squarely cemented and set to rejoin...

There are a lot of options to consider when looking for a set of fins these days and it’s never been more important to get it right. Fins can make or break a board’s performance. Get it right for the conditions and it will seem like there isn’t a drop...

The iconic Mangamaunu Bay earns reprieve from NZ Transport Agency’s shared use cycle path plans following the Surfbreak Protection Society’s judicial review mediation. It’s a win for all surfers in New Zealand and testament to the power of the people when working together for a cause. UPDATED: November 27, 2018...

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New Zealand Surf Journal is the home of New Zealand surfing. We exist to celebrate the inspiring people, places and culture of surfing in New Zealand. We support New Zealand's best surf photographers, writers and thinkers who tell the story of wave riding in New Zealand ... as it happens. Occasionally raw, mostly inspirational, but always at the heart of it all.